Elaborate parties, and the inter-mingling of local artists, musicians, business giants and top-national performing acts– all either stayed here as visitors or lived here as residents, and all were treated to only the best during their stay. It was the high-life in the roaring Twenties.

And it was in 1923, in the area today known as University Circle, that the lavish Wade Park Manor residential hotel was opened.

George A. Schneider, the former developer/manager of The Cleveland Athletic Club, took the reigns of the Wade Park Project and decided on the New York architectural firm of George Post & Sons, who had a Cleveland office, to design the building. Among the Cleveland projects that the firm was responsible for, The Cleveland Trust Building (1908) at East 9th Street and Euclid Avenue is most notable.

The 11-story, 400 room residential hotel was designed in Georgian Revival style with warm buff limestone, Tapestry Brick and clay-based ceramic terracotta being the main components to the exterior. The Wade Park Manor structure was fire-proof, with it’s frame made of steel and reinforced concrete.

The interiors were palace-like, utilizing only the finest materials from around the world, and included a grand lobby with an 18-foot ceiling and paneled oak and marble walls, two dining rooms and a ballroom and banquet room with dinner seating for 250 and room for 400 for balls and concerts. Of the 400 guest rooms, 40 were spacious single rooms, with the remaining rooms divided into two to six room suites. Being mere footsteps from Wade Park and the Cleveland Art Museum– the rooms offered spectacular views of the city.

Today, The Wade Park Manor operates as an upscale retirement community, under the name of Judson Manor. Photography of the building’s interior spaces was not allowed.

With some landfill, and $360,000 budgeted for the project, the design plans of local architect J. Milton Dyer, for a new, state-of-the-art Cleveland Coast Guard Station came to fruition in August of 1940. Located at the mouth of the Cuyahoga River on Whiskey Island, and Cleveland’s Lake Erie shoreline, the station was designed in streamline moderne architectural style, and intended to resemble a Great Lakes vessel and replicate what it was like being aboard ship. The Station was utilized until 1974, when the Coast Guard relocated to a new station.

Although vacant since then, the architecturally historic facility is being cleaned-up, renovated, and plans are being drawn to include the site as part of the Cleveland Metroparks System. It really will be a beautiful asset in the development of the City’s lakefront once it is completed. The Cleveland Coast Guard Station was added to the National Register of Historic Places and is has been designated as a City of Cleveland Historic Landmark.

On the Cuyahoga River, in downtown Cleveland, where the river exits out into Lake Erie–“American Courage,” a river-class vessel heading in to it’s next destination. The American Courage was built in 1979 by the Sturgeon Bay, Wisconsin Bay Shipbuilding Corporation. It is powered by two 3500 Horse Power diesel engines. It also is equipped with 1,000 Horse Power “bow” and 600 Horse Power stern thrusters to negotiate tight waters in port, or on rivers such as the Cuyahoga.

“The Crooked River”– The Cuyahoga, as it flows slowly southward through the Village of Mantua, in Portage County, Ohio.

Stretching 85 miles in total length, The Cuyahoga River begins in Burton, Ohio, flowing south and west through Akron, in Summit County changing direction, where it heads north and eventually empties into Lake Erie, in downtown Cleveland.

Two photos of the frozen tundra of Lake Erie, taken at the Edgewater Park Pier, in the wake of the 2014 Polar Vortex that swept harshly through Cleveland and the Midwest and Eastern United States earlier this week. Edgewater Park is located on Cleveland’s near-west side, in eye shot of downtown, and is part of the Cleveland Metroparks system.

The Cleveland Public Power Plant (formerly the Municipal Light Plant) sits on the shores of Lake Erie, near downtown Cleveland. The artwork “The Song of the Whales” painted by artist Robert Wyland, was completed in 1997, and is one of many “Whaling Walls” that the artist has rendered. The Cleveland example is number 75 in his “collection” of 90 such mural paintings nationally. The dimensions of the art, which is readily viewable from I-90 heading into downtown, is 300 feet long, and 108 feet high. Definitely a site to see when visiting the city!

Brandywine Creek falling over the layered sandstone and shale that formed millions of years ago, creating the spectacular 65-foot Brandywine Waterfalls– part of the Northern Ohio treasure: The Cuyahoga Valley National Park. The falls are located in Sagamore Hills Township, approximately 20 miles Southeast of downtown Cleveland.

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Three photographs of the Center Street Bridge, located in the heart of the “Flats” near downtown Cleveland. The first two photographs, looking south eastward, show a freighter ship as it approaches the bridge and as the “Bob-tail Swing Bridge” moves into passing position and allows ships slowly through the narrow channel. The Center Street Swing Bridge was built in 1910 providing foot and automobile traffic to travel east and west across the river. Once the most popular form of bridge in the U.S. today it is the only one of it’s kind still in operation in the State of Ohio. Towering above the Center Street Bridge is the mighty Detroit-Superior Avenue Bridge, built later. The third photograph from street level shows the Center Street Bridge from the east bank of the Cuyahoga River spanning across the waterway.

Top photo taken September 23, 2013
Middle photo taken September 6, 2013
Bottom photo taken August 15, 2012

Four silhouette photographs taken with my new Nikon D5100 camera. These beautiful ships sailed into the Port of Cleveland, on the downtown waterfront of Lake Erie for “The Tall Ship Festival”–just in time for the 4th of July holiday and the adjoining weekend! Click on the images for larger versions with more detail.

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“I Don’t Want to Go Home” – Southside Johnny and the Asbury Jukes (1978, live from the Cleveland Agora with Bruce Springsteen)

“The Fountain of Eternal Life” located on Memorial Plaza, in Downtown Cleveland, was dedicated in 1964, and created to honor Cleveland residents who gave their life serving the United States in World War II. The statue depicts a man reaching for the sky–escaping the flames of war. Designed by Marshall Frederick, a Cleveland Institute of Art graduate, it stands 46 feet in height and is constructed of bronze.

The Cuyahoga River looking toward the east bank of the Flats in downtown Cleveland. Back in the 1970’s, 80’s and 90’s the East and West banks of the Cuyahoga River in the Flats were booming with popular nightlife– both sides of the river were home to converted warehouses turned raucous weekend party bars. Several concert venues and high end restaurants also staked claim there. Crime and assorted other “social problems” eventually drove people to other areas of town for fun, and the flats entertainment district eventually dried up. Today, the city is trying to renew life into the area with upscale apartments and condos, new restaurants, and the New Cleveland Aquarium.

Built during the reign of Augustus Caesar, circa 15 B.C. “The Temple of Dendur” was gifted to the United States by the government of Egypt in 1965. In 1967 the Metropolitan Museum of Art, in Manhattan, New York was awarded the temple for display. In 1978, the structure was placed permanently as the focal point in the beautiful Sackler Wing of the Met, pictured here.

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Lock 3 Park invites a beautiful stroll along the old Erie Canal in downtown Akron, Ohio. The towering building in the picture is listed in the National Register of Historic Places for its architectural and engineering significance. Completed in 1930, this Art Deco Style office building now houses apartments and other leased space.